8 ms·

If Sweden succeeds, lockdowns will all have been for nothing

51 points by 1cvmask 7y ago

cm2187 7y ago
I also don’t think we can completely exclude that the peak observed in sweden corresponds to the seasonality of the virus.
JohnJamesRambo 7y ago
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sweden-coronavirus-deaths-lockdown-social-distancing-denmark-finland-norway-a9470771.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sweden-coron... "Alarming data has shown Sweden’s approach to containing coronavirus has led to a far greater number of fatalities than their Nordic neighbours." Is this article I read a week ago not true anymore?
- tomohawk 7y ago
  A more representative comparison: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-million?tab=chart&time=2020-03-08..&country=BEL+FRA+DEU+ITA+ESP+SWE+GBR+USA https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-mill... It's great that Norway and Finland are doing well, but Sweden isn't doing that bad.
  - mopsi 7y ago
    So far, Sweden is a negative outlier compared to the rest of the region: https://twitter.com/MarkkuPeltonen/status/1253902217095942145 https://twitter.com/MarkkuPeltonen/status/125390221709594214...
    - tomohawk 7y ago
      Why pick just Scandanavia? Yes, those are neighboring countries, but it also seems like cherry picking. Here's an interesting article talking about why it is difficult to compare numbers. https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/why-the-worlds-highest-coronavirus-death-rate-is-in-europe-s-capital https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/why-the-worlds-hig...
      - drewcoo 7y ago
        The correct fruit metaphor is apples to apples.
  - IAmEveryone 7y ago
    Here's the comparison of the four Scandinavian countries: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/total-covid-deaths-per-million?tab=chart&year=2020-04-25&country=DNK+FIN+NOR+SWE https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/total-covid-deaths-per-mi... Yeah, no. Sweden doesn't look particularly successful.
    - glofish 7y ago
      the comparison makes no sense, of course they will have more cases, the goal was never to match the number of cases. Every country will have to reopen like Sweden, most plan to do so within weeks, note how no country has eradicated the disease - what do you think will happen when they reopen? Exactly what is happening in Sweden. The goal of the flattening is to avoid overloading the hospitals not to "win". There is no winning. The only difference will be that they still have their economy in good shape.
    - phillipseamore 7y ago
      To compare; it's important to note that in a typical month, twice as many die in Sweden compared to Denmark, without Covid.
      - IAmEveryone 7y ago
        The numbers are per capita. Unless Swedes have a life expectancy of around 40 years, this is properly normalised.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
  - JohnJamesRambo 7y ago
    I don't see what you are seeing I guess; I see Sweden with 6x and 13x more deaths per million than Norway and Finland? https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-million?year=2020-04-25&time=2020-03-08. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-mill.... It's the reddest thing I see on the map, implying that lockdowns were absolutely essential?
- finnthehuman 7y ago
  >Is this article I read a week ago not true anymore? Your quote is about fatality numbers. Public policy to reduce transmission of covid19 is meant to keep the infection curve flat enough to avoid overwhelming hospitals. Unless Sweeden's hospitals are overwhelmed, the articles are orthogonal.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
glofish 7y ago
I now believe that no one really knows much about the spread of this virus. Hence I find it naive to predict that the peak was on one day or another, plus it is very unlikely that Sweden would not get even more cases. They are most certainly not at their peak. Look at Spain, locked down hard on March 14th, yet the number of cases on April 4th were the same as on April 24th (!) (and among of the largest observed over 6K). No one would have ever predicted that back in March 14th, that after more than a month of keeping the population like prisoners the number of cases would be still so high with no chance of going to zero any time soon. Eventually, within weeks now, they have to relax the rules, and with that they will be right where Sweden is. When it is all said and done who did better, which society is better off overall. My bet is on Sweden, but the answer will not be determined tomorrow, next week or even next month. Perhaps by this time next year.
- mongol 7y ago
  Yes it is like following a soccer match and we are 10 minutes into the first half. One team might play significantly better than the other but much time is remaining and it is much too early to draw conclusions.
- iampims 7y ago
  The number of cases is a function of the number of tests. The number of fatalities would be a better representation of the lockdown effects.
  - glofish 7y ago
    The problem with the number of fatalities is that only one fatality is tracked. Where is the counter for the children that die because not getting immunized because of the lockdown? (Turns out there are already tens of millions of them not getting vaccines, measles immunization is down 50%) Where is the fatality counter for depression, for weakened immune systems that lockdown causes, etc. Where is the counter for all the diseases not treated because of the lockdown? Where is the counter for famine and poverty? Do you see the problem? There is only one counter up there ticking up every day, all common sense sacrificed to make the tick go slower. If we had a counter for all the deaths caused by the lockdown there would be no lockdown at all.
DeonPenny 7y ago
Yeh it's should put of lot of eggs on faces but I doubt it. if this ends up being the right decision no one will hear about it cause it makes to many people look incompetent
TomMckenny 7y ago
Likewise as it fails, their higher fatality rate helps show what was avoided. Although most countries under lock down could not handle the peak hospitalizations that Sweden can which would mean far more deaths. And one would need to compare Sweden's results to similar countries like others in Scandinavia. And at the moment Sweden's death rate is 6 to 10 times its neighbors[1]. So a success or failure in Sweden is extremely informative but not completely transferable. Swedes are pretty generous conducting this experiment on their population for the edification of the survivors. [1]https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-million?tab=chart&time=2020-03-08..&country=SWE+NOR+DNK+FIN https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-mill...
- koheripbal 7y ago
  Sweden doesn't have a particularly high number of ventilators per capita, so their ability to manage the peak is not necessarily much higher than other nations.
- bitexploder 7y ago
  Thing is we know zero contact means no Virus. But what lives beyond that? Who knows what is right. The morals and ethics of this, confounded with our knowledge and technology is profoundly complex. People are failing to grasp nuance here.
  - IAmEveryone 7y ago
    > But what lives beyond that? What lives beyond what? > The morals and ethics of this, confounded with our knowledge and technology is profoundly complex. "complex" is just latin for "put together". What relevance does the complexity of life have for its value? > People are failing to grasp nuance here. I am comfortable with the lack of nuance inherent in trying to avoid death.
    - bitexploder 7y ago
      The floor is low. Absolute isolation is impossible. The nuance is that we lack so much knowledge to make a less restrictive choice. We basically are not advanced enough to act with clarity beyond broad moves. These are just pent up ramblings. Too much isolation. It’s the right thing. But with better knowledge and systems this would not be needed. We have the tech. Maybe we should not.
detaro 7y ago
Just a few other recent Sweden coronavirus discussions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22919074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22919074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22944891 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22944891 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22908103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22908103
sudoaza 7y ago
Sweden new cases by day are still growing
cczizou 7y ago
Can we really compare conscientious Swedes with bold Brits or brash Americans? I live in a state in the USA where our Governor has instated a full lockdown. Yet, our citizens are out and about intentionally going against guidelines.
- koheripbal 7y ago
  Being outside isn't necessarily dangerous if you are maintaining safe distances. What continues transmission, more than anything these days, are infection chains that spread through families, at healthcare facilities, and at other essential services that remain open and include person contact or item contact. Of course, the degree to which people take social distancing seriously impacts the R of contagion, but as the number of cases increase, so do the percentage of people that take it more seriously.
  - cczizou 7y ago
    I agree. Where I live, social groups and families have continued to meet in person without regard to spreading the illness. My state is seeing new case counts flatten but my specific county is still gaining new cases at a higher rate than the rest of the region. It’s hard to not feel a little frustrated with these folks.
- bjourne 7y ago
  The commonality is that people care about their own lives. Not about old people in nursing homes dying. Everyone in Sweden knows that our numbers are atrocious and that many more are dying here than in neighboring countries. Yet the government's soft strategy has massive support and almost no one wants to see stricter measures like school lock downs or closed restaurants. I think it's very hard to say who is right and who is wrong here. Even if a lock down saves lives, it affects so many negatively. Especially kids who lose weeks of months of schooling who they will have a hard time getting back.
  - foogazi 7y ago
    > Especially kids who lose weeks of months of schooling who they will have a hard time getting back. I really don’t get the thing with compulsory schooling - it’s not if they will never get educational instruction in their lives
IAmEveryone 7y ago
Sweden has 10x as many deaths as its neighbours Finland and Norway each, or 5x as many scaled to population. It's third neighbour, Denmark, also has about half the population and only 1/5th as many deaths. All these countries are somewhat similar in wealth, rural vs. urban population, etc. It has 4x as many deaths as Germany adjusted for population, and 4x as many deaths as Austria (not adjusted for population, because they are similar). And so on... Take the worst European countries: Spain and Italy. These two have about twice as many deaths as Sweden relative to population. But then again, their numbers are declining, while Sweden's is still growing.
Gustomaximus 7y ago
1) Sweden has significantly higher deaths per capita. 2) Even if this works out for Sweden, they took a massive gamble with their citizens lives going for herd immunity with so many unknown. An extreme example but its like that guy that sold everything bet it on red/black at Vegas. He doubled his wealth in a day but it still doesn't make him a model of financial management.
- bjourne 7y ago
  That's not an apt analogy since Sweden's strategy is guided by epidemiologists and not gamblers. In other countries politicians have taken more extreme measures than recommended by the experts. For example, the UK planned to apply the same strategy but the death tolls became too high and political pressure forced them to change course. I'm not an epidemiologist so I cannot say (yet) who is wrong and who is right. But I can for sure say that they are doing their best and they are not gambling with citizens lives.
  - Gustomaximus 7y ago
    I would position they gambled. We're still not sure if people become immune and if so how long. We have an idea of better statistics but there is much unknown, especially in the early days of these decisions. Gambling at an analytical level is playing the odds as much as these guys are playing odds from a position of expertise from their field. Maybe we dont call it game ling because it's "analysis" but the difference is language but the fundamentals are the same. They are both taking bets based on incomplete information and what they feel is the best option. If the knew more and weren't modeling off big assumed variables I'd agree with you. But when you make decisions off big unknown variables I say it's gambling regardless of your education or level of expertise.
imustbeevil 7y ago
Sweden: 10M population, 18K cases, 2K deaths [0]. North Carolina: 10M population, 8K cases, 300 deaths [1]. [0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/
- cczizou 7y ago
  Correct me if I’m wrong, I think North Carolina’s outbreaks began a bit later than Sweden’s?
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- lsllc 7y ago
  Massachusetts: 6.8M population, 53.3K cases, 2730 deaths. [0] [0] https://www.mass.gov/doc/covid-19-dashboard-april-25-2020/download https://www.mass.gov/doc/covid-19-dashboard-april-25-2020/do...
  - imustbeevil 7y ago
    Overlooking the fact that with 200% more cases Massachusetts has only 35% more deaths: Sweden population density: 64 people / square mile. Massachusetts population density: 890 (14x) people / square mile. --- Stockholm population density: 5,200 people / square mile. Boston population density: 13,800 (2.5x) people / square mile. (all sources just wikipedia entries)
chadash 7y ago
Some of the comments here are missing the point. Yes, Sweden has more deaths than it's neighbors. But obviously that's true... they didn't lock down. The issue is that lockdowns can only last so long. The initial hope was that we can quickly find an effective treatment for this virus, but so far, that's looking unlikely. Hydroxycloriquine and Remdesivir were the best hopes and in controlled studies, they aren't showing effectiveness. While an effective treatment is still possible, it will likely require a new drug to be developed and tested, which is a far more time consuming process than using a drug that is already approved for other uses (since you already understand the side effects). Meanwhile, a vaccine is still a year or two away according to most experts, if we ever find one at all (some viruses are very hard to find vaccinations for). So eventually, countries will need to lift their lockdowns. People in democracies are already getting restless. And once that happens, rates of infections will go up, and countries that have had very low death rates so far due to lockdowns will start to see their numbers climb. Meanwhile, Sweden will have already had a large share of their population who already had the virus and are (hopefully) immune to it, at least short term. That said, Sweden's strategy might not work for every country even if it ends up working for them. They have a very strong healthcare system and a relatively healthy population. Other countries may not fare so well.
- basch 7y ago
  >Hydroxycloriquine and Remdesivir were the best hopes and in controlled studies, they aren't showing effectiveness. While an effective treatment is still possible, it will likely require a new drug to be developed and tested They were the best hopes in the sense that stockpiles existed, not that they were the best at fighting it. For example, Camostat and Favipiravir are other candidates but not approved in the US. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_drug_repurposing_research https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_drug_repurposing_rese...
- rntksi 7y ago
  "There is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from COVID-19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection." https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/immunity-passports-in-the-context-of-covid-19 https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/immunity-p...
nxcho 7y ago
This is a very good explanation of the how and why of the Swedish strategy https://bppblog.com/2020/04/23/the-swedish-exception/ https://bppblog.com/2020/04/23/the-swedish-exception/
endogui 7y ago
Unlike other countries which announce fatalities on the date they become known to authorities. Sweden updates its fatality chart retroactively on the day each person actually died. Since it takes a long time to get/process death information to/in the national government, the effect of this is that Sweden's Covid fatality chart always looks like it has just peaked. The apparent dip in daily deaths is just a delay in reporting. https://mobile.twitter.com/NiklasJonsson91/status/1252976186277462016 https://mobile.twitter.com/NiklasJonsson91/status/1252976186...
WheelsAtLarge 7y ago
I think it's very hard to extrapolate Sweden's result to other parts of the world. We have seen what New York and Italy have had to deal with in terms of deaths and that's after they went into a lockdown. I'm sure there are parts in the world where a lockdown was not needed but how can you figure that out beforehand. I'm sure there have been mistakes made during this pandemic but it's too early to decide which have been good or bad.
6nf 7y ago
This submission was flagged. I wonder why? Political reasons? I don't think it's a bad article.
smitty1e 7y ago
Hannan is a serious, thoughtful writer and does not merit flagging merely for broaching an opinion athwart the narrative.
- Ozzie_osman 7y ago
  Yeah I agree. Why is this flagged?
kindly_fo 7y ago
I hope they succeed.
foogazi 7y ago
Good for the swedes, we’ll find out eventually right?
rspoerri 7y ago
You cant compare a country already mostly isolated (like sweden) with one heavily infected (like italy) and say it was meaningless to shutdown. Thats BS
babulus 7y ago
Bullshit. Every country's different.
railing1650 7y ago
So a nobel prize winning scientist giving his opinion is banned? Keep bending over buddy.. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23062531 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23062531

51 points by 1cvmask 7y ago

I also don’t think we can completely exclude that the peak observed in sweden corresponds to the seasonality of the virus.

JohnJamesRambo 7y ago

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sweden-coronavirus-deaths-lockdown-social-distancing-denmark-finland-norway-a9470771.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sweden-coron... "Alarming data has shown Sweden’s approach to containing coronavirus has led to a far greater number of fatalities than their Nordic neighbours." Is this article I read a week ago not true anymore?

tomohawk 7y ago
A more representative comparison: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-million?tab=chart&time=2020-03-08..&country=BEL+FRA+DEU+ITA+ESP+SWE+GBR+USA https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-mill... It's great that Norway and Finland are doing well, but Sweden isn't doing that bad.
- mopsi 7y ago
  So far, Sweden is a negative outlier compared to the rest of the region: https://twitter.com/MarkkuPeltonen/status/1253902217095942145 https://twitter.com/MarkkuPeltonen/status/125390221709594214...
  - tomohawk 7y ago
    Why pick just Scandanavia? Yes, those are neighboring countries, but it also seems like cherry picking. Here's an interesting article talking about why it is difficult to compare numbers. https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/why-the-worlds-highest-coronavirus-death-rate-is-in-europe-s-capital https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/why-the-worlds-hig...
    - drewcoo 7y ago
      The correct fruit metaphor is apples to apples.
- IAmEveryone 7y ago
  Here's the comparison of the four Scandinavian countries: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/total-covid-deaths-per-million?tab=chart&year=2020-04-25&country=DNK+FIN+NOR+SWE https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/total-covid-deaths-per-mi... Yeah, no. Sweden doesn't look particularly successful.
  - glofish 7y ago
    the comparison makes no sense, of course they will have more cases, the goal was never to match the number of cases. Every country will have to reopen like Sweden, most plan to do so within weeks, note how no country has eradicated the disease - what do you think will happen when they reopen? Exactly what is happening in Sweden. The goal of the flattening is to avoid overloading the hospitals not to "win". There is no winning. The only difference will be that they still have their economy in good shape.
  - phillipseamore 7y ago
    To compare; it's important to note that in a typical month, twice as many die in Sweden compared to Denmark, without Covid.
    - IAmEveryone 7y ago
      The numbers are per capita. Unless Swedes have a life expectancy of around 40 years, this is properly normalised.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- JohnJamesRambo 7y ago
  I don't see what you are seeing I guess; I see Sweden with 6x and 13x more deaths per million than Norway and Finland? https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-million?year=2020-04-25&time=2020-03-08. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-mill.... It's the reddest thing I see on the map, implying that lockdowns were absolutely essential?
finnthehuman 7y ago
>Is this article I read a week ago not true anymore? Your quote is about fatality numbers. Public policy to reduce transmission of covid19 is meant to keep the infection curve flat enough to avoid overwhelming hospitals. Unless Sweeden's hospitals are overwhelmed, the articles are orthogonal.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

glofish 7y ago

I now believe that no one really knows much about the spread of this virus. Hence I find it naive to predict that the peak was on one day or another, plus it is very unlikely that Sweden would not get even more cases. They are most certainly not at their peak. Look at Spain, locked down hard on March 14th, yet the number of cases on April 4th were the same as on April 24th (!) (and among of the largest observed over 6K). No one would have ever predicted that back in March 14th, that after more than a month of keeping the population like prisoners the number of cases would be still so high with no chance of going to zero any time soon. Eventually, within weeks now, they have to relax the rules, and with that they will be right where Sweden is. When it is all said and done who did better, which society is better off overall. My bet is on Sweden, but the answer will not be determined tomorrow, next week or even next month. Perhaps by this time next year.

mongol 7y ago
Yes it is like following a soccer match and we are 10 minutes into the first half. One team might play significantly better than the other but much time is remaining and it is much too early to draw conclusions.
iampims 7y ago
The number of cases is a function of the number of tests. The number of fatalities would be a better representation of the lockdown effects.
- glofish 7y ago
  The problem with the number of fatalities is that only one fatality is tracked. Where is the counter for the children that die because not getting immunized because of the lockdown? (Turns out there are already tens of millions of them not getting vaccines, measles immunization is down 50%) Where is the fatality counter for depression, for weakened immune systems that lockdown causes, etc. Where is the counter for all the diseases not treated because of the lockdown? Where is the counter for famine and poverty? Do you see the problem? There is only one counter up there ticking up every day, all common sense sacrificed to make the tick go slower. If we had a counter for all the deaths caused by the lockdown there would be no lockdown at all.

DeonPenny 7y ago

Yeh it's should put of lot of eggs on faces but I doubt it. if this ends up being the right decision no one will hear about it cause it makes to many people look incompetent

TomMckenny 7y ago

Likewise as it fails, their higher fatality rate helps show what was avoided. Although most countries under lock down could not handle the peak hospitalizations that Sweden can which would mean far more deaths. And one would need to compare Sweden's results to similar countries like others in Scandinavia. And at the moment Sweden's death rate is 6 to 10 times its neighbors[1]. So a success or failure in Sweden is extremely informative but not completely transferable. Swedes are pretty generous conducting this experiment on their population for the edification of the survivors. [1]https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-million?tab=chart&time=2020-03-08..&country=SWE+NOR+DNK+FIN https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/new-covid-deaths-per-mill...

koheripbal 7y ago
Sweden doesn't have a particularly high number of ventilators per capita, so their ability to manage the peak is not necessarily much higher than other nations.
bitexploder 7y ago
Thing is we know zero contact means no Virus. But what lives beyond that? Who knows what is right. The morals and ethics of this, confounded with our knowledge and technology is profoundly complex. People are failing to grasp nuance here.
- IAmEveryone 7y ago
  > But what lives beyond that? What lives beyond what? > The morals and ethics of this, confounded with our knowledge and technology is profoundly complex. "complex" is just latin for "put together". What relevance does the complexity of life have for its value? > People are failing to grasp nuance here. I am comfortable with the lack of nuance inherent in trying to avoid death.
  - bitexploder 7y ago
    The floor is low. Absolute isolation is impossible. The nuance is that we lack so much knowledge to make a less restrictive choice. We basically are not advanced enough to act with clarity beyond broad moves. These are just pent up ramblings. Too much isolation. It’s the right thing. But with better knowledge and systems this would not be needed. We have the tech. Maybe we should not.

detaro 7y ago

Just a few other recent Sweden coronavirus discussions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22919074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22919074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22944891 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22944891 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22908103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22908103

sudoaza 7y ago

Sweden new cases by day are still growing

cczizou 7y ago

Can we really compare conscientious Swedes with bold Brits or brash Americans? I live in a state in the USA where our Governor has instated a full lockdown. Yet, our citizens are out and about intentionally going against guidelines.

koheripbal 7y ago
Being outside isn't necessarily dangerous if you are maintaining safe distances. What continues transmission, more than anything these days, are infection chains that spread through families, at healthcare facilities, and at other essential services that remain open and include person contact or item contact. Of course, the degree to which people take social distancing seriously impacts the R of contagion, but as the number of cases increase, so do the percentage of people that take it more seriously.
- cczizou 7y ago
  I agree. Where I live, social groups and families have continued to meet in person without regard to spreading the illness. My state is seeing new case counts flatten but my specific county is still gaining new cases at a higher rate than the rest of the region. It’s hard to not feel a little frustrated with these folks.
bjourne 7y ago
The commonality is that people care about their own lives. Not about old people in nursing homes dying. Everyone in Sweden knows that our numbers are atrocious and that many more are dying here than in neighboring countries. Yet the government's soft strategy has massive support and almost no one wants to see stricter measures like school lock downs or closed restaurants. I think it's very hard to say who is right and who is wrong here. Even if a lock down saves lives, it affects so many negatively. Especially kids who lose weeks of months of schooling who they will have a hard time getting back.
- foogazi 7y ago
  > Especially kids who lose weeks of months of schooling who they will have a hard time getting back. I really don’t get the thing with compulsory schooling - it’s not if they will never get educational instruction in their lives

IAmEveryone 7y ago

Sweden has 10x as many deaths as its neighbours Finland and Norway each, or 5x as many scaled to population. It's third neighbour, Denmark, also has about half the population and only 1/5th as many deaths. All these countries are somewhat similar in wealth, rural vs. urban population, etc. It has 4x as many deaths as Germany adjusted for population, and 4x as many deaths as Austria (not adjusted for population, because they are similar). And so on... Take the worst European countries: Spain and Italy. These two have about twice as many deaths as Sweden relative to population. But then again, their numbers are declining, while Sweden's is still growing.

Gustomaximus 7y ago

1) Sweden has significantly higher deaths per capita. 2) Even if this works out for Sweden, they took a massive gamble with their citizens lives going for herd immunity with so many unknown. An extreme example but its like that guy that sold everything bet it on red/black at Vegas. He doubled his wealth in a day but it still doesn't make him a model of financial management.

bjourne 7y ago
That's not an apt analogy since Sweden's strategy is guided by epidemiologists and not gamblers. In other countries politicians have taken more extreme measures than recommended by the experts. For example, the UK planned to apply the same strategy but the death tolls became too high and political pressure forced them to change course. I'm not an epidemiologist so I cannot say (yet) who is wrong and who is right. But I can for sure say that they are doing their best and they are not gambling with citizens lives.
- Gustomaximus 7y ago
  I would position they gambled. We're still not sure if people become immune and if so how long. We have an idea of better statistics but there is much unknown, especially in the early days of these decisions. Gambling at an analytical level is playing the odds as much as these guys are playing odds from a position of expertise from their field. Maybe we dont call it game ling because it's "analysis" but the difference is language but the fundamentals are the same. They are both taking bets based on incomplete information and what they feel is the best option. If the knew more and weren't modeling off big assumed variables I'd agree with you. But when you make decisions off big unknown variables I say it's gambling regardless of your education or level of expertise.

imustbeevil 7y ago

Sweden: 10M population, 18K cases, 2K deaths [0]. North Carolina: 10M population, 8K cases, 300 deaths [1]. [0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/

cczizou 7y ago
Correct me if I’m wrong, I think North Carolina’s outbreaks began a bit later than Sweden’s?
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
lsllc 7y ago
Massachusetts: 6.8M population, 53.3K cases, 2730 deaths. [0] [0] https://www.mass.gov/doc/covid-19-dashboard-april-25-2020/download https://www.mass.gov/doc/covid-19-dashboard-april-25-2020/do...
- imustbeevil 7y ago
  Overlooking the fact that with 200% more cases Massachusetts has only 35% more deaths: Sweden population density: 64 people / square mile. Massachusetts population density: 890 (14x) people / square mile. --- Stockholm population density: 5,200 people / square mile. Boston population density: 13,800 (2.5x) people / square mile. (all sources just wikipedia entries)

chadash 7y ago

Some of the comments here are missing the point. Yes, Sweden has more deaths than it's neighbors. But obviously that's true... they didn't lock down. The issue is that lockdowns can only last so long. The initial hope was that we can quickly find an effective treatment for this virus, but so far, that's looking unlikely. Hydroxycloriquine and Remdesivir were the best hopes and in controlled studies, they aren't showing effectiveness. While an effective treatment is still possible, it will likely require a new drug to be developed and tested, which is a far more time consuming process than using a drug that is already approved for other uses (since you already understand the side effects). Meanwhile, a vaccine is still a year or two away according to most experts, if we ever find one at all (some viruses are very hard to find vaccinations for). So eventually, countries will need to lift their lockdowns. People in democracies are already getting restless. And once that happens, rates of infections will go up, and countries that have had very low death rates so far due to lockdowns will start to see their numbers climb. Meanwhile, Sweden will have already had a large share of their population who already had the virus and are (hopefully) immune to it, at least short term. That said, Sweden's strategy might not work for every country even if it ends up working for them. They have a very strong healthcare system and a relatively healthy population. Other countries may not fare so well.

basch 7y ago
>Hydroxycloriquine and Remdesivir were the best hopes and in controlled studies, they aren't showing effectiveness. While an effective treatment is still possible, it will likely require a new drug to be developed and tested They were the best hopes in the sense that stockpiles existed, not that they were the best at fighting it. For example, Camostat and Favipiravir are other candidates but not approved in the US. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_drug_repurposing_research https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_drug_repurposing_rese...
rntksi 7y ago
"There is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from COVID-19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection." https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/immunity-passports-in-the-context-of-covid-19 https://www.who.int/news-room/commentaries/detail/immunity-p...

nxcho 7y ago

This is a very good explanation of the how and why of the Swedish strategy https://bppblog.com/2020/04/23/the-swedish-exception/ https://bppblog.com/2020/04/23/the-swedish-exception/

endogui 7y ago

Unlike other countries which announce fatalities on the date they become known to authorities. Sweden updates its fatality chart retroactively on the day each person actually died. Since it takes a long time to get/process death information to/in the national government, the effect of this is that Sweden's Covid fatality chart always looks like it has just peaked. The apparent dip in daily deaths is just a delay in reporting. https://mobile.twitter.com/NiklasJonsson91/status/1252976186277462016 https://mobile.twitter.com/NiklasJonsson91/status/1252976186...

WheelsAtLarge 7y ago

I think it's very hard to extrapolate Sweden's result to other parts of the world. We have seen what New York and Italy have had to deal with in terms of deaths and that's after they went into a lockdown. I'm sure there are parts in the world where a lockdown was not needed but how can you figure that out beforehand. I'm sure there have been mistakes made during this pandemic but it's too early to decide which have been good or bad.

6nf 7y ago

This submission was flagged. I wonder why? Political reasons? I don't think it's a bad article.

smitty1e 7y ago

Hannan is a serious, thoughtful writer and does not merit flagging merely for broaching an opinion athwart the narrative.

Ozzie_osman 7y ago
Yeah I agree. Why is this flagged?

kindly_fo 7y ago

I hope they succeed.

foogazi 7y ago

Good for the swedes, we’ll find out eventually right?

rspoerri 7y ago

You cant compare a country already mostly isolated (like sweden) with one heavily infected (like italy) and say it was meaningless to shutdown. Thats BS

babulus 7y ago

Bullshit. Every country's different.

railing1650 7y ago

So a nobel prize winning scientist giving his opinion is banned? Keep bending over buddy.. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23062531 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23062531